Next Gen / No Kill: Olive Eng-Canty on Turning Traditional Craft into a Slow-fashion Manifesto

Q+A with Olive Eng-Canty
Parsons BFA 2025

This is Our Art

At No Kill Magazine, we’re after what might change the game — not just what’s next. Some of the sharpest ideas are coming from designers rewriting fashion’s rules.
In Next Gen / No Kill, we spotlight standout fashion graduates whose work opens up new conversations and possibilities. From New York’s top programs and beyond, these are the designers shaping a future of fashion defined by intelligence, creativity, and intention.

What is the inspiration or concept behind your collection?
“This Is Our Art” is a sartorial celebration of “women’s work”; the ethical, soulful, and thoughtful practice of garment creation. Through the upcycling of disposed textiles (collected from thrift stores and donated by people I know), I developed a slow-fashion system of repurposing based on traditional “craft” techniques.

It was born from my realization that the average person today is unfamiliar with how much skill, time, and labor goes into garment creation, leading to unethical consumption and disposal of fast fashion.

“This Is Our Art” is a collection of 5 core pieces of wearable art, each honoring a different garment making craft, and each challenging today’s fast fashion industry norms.
Look One, quilting, began with using collected fabric scraps and vintage patchwork patterns to create my own upcycled quilt squares. After months of creating individual patchwork pieces, I was finally able to join them to create a dress.

For Look Two, felting, I sourced a 4-pound bag of raw wool roving from a second-hand store. I used this wool to make my own felt on the FeltLoom in the shape of jacket pieces, which I stitched together, and needle-felted the face of a sheep onto.

For Look Three, knitting, I spun my own chunky yarns from a combination of thinner, second-hand yarns. I handknit the sweater from these yarns, and then used additional thrifted yarn to add duplicate-stitch embroidery.

Look Four, weaving, began by building my own looms (from found wood and nails) in the shape of pants pattern pieces. I then hand-wove four panels from second-hand yarn and hand-stitched them together into a pair of zero-waste, handwoven pants.

Lastly, Look Five, embroidery, is an apron made from second-hand textiles. Over hundreds of hours, I completely covered the apron in detailed hand-embroideries made from fabric scraps.

What’s one material or technique you’re currently obsessed with?
I am currently obsessed with zero-waste weaving, the technique I used to create Look Four in my collection. The technique itself is so simple and almost rudimentary, but somehow simultaneously so innovative. Oftentimes when I am explaining the process to people, I am met with responses like, “Oh my god, I didn’t even know you could make clothes like that!”.

The process begins with a large piece of wood and nails, as well as a sewing pattern that you like; I used a vintage pants pattern that belonged to my late grandmother. You then secure the pattern onto the piece of wood and trace around it with an added 1.5 inch margin to account for weaving tension.

Next, using a T-square and a ruler, you have to draw vertical parallel lines all across the entire piece of wood, adding a new line every ½ centimeter. This is a time consuming process, but it makes sure that your warp will be even while you are weaving, ensuring a good textile structure.

After you have drawn all of your lines, you will notice that there are a bunch of points where the parallel lines intersect with the outline of the traced pattern. These intersection points are where you will put the nails. Hammer in all of your nails, and then you are ready to string the warp. Using the parallel lines you drew as a guide, wrap your yarn around the nails, making sure to keep the warps parallel and equal distances apart from each other.

I used second-hand yarn strung in a tartan pattern to make my pants, but you can use any yarn or even ribbons and fabric scraps for this. Once you have strung the warp, you are ready to weave! I like weaving in plain-weave, because it gives it a more obvious handmade appearance. This process is incredibly tedious, but the result is a beautiful, zero-waste garment that truly embodies the spirit of sustainability and slow-fashion.

What does fashion mean to you today?
Fashion, for me, has always been more than just clothes. Whether it be through wearing or making, fashion has always been an expression of my identity. I am a non-binary, neurodivergent, mixed-race lesbian, and I have always struggled to fit into society’s expectations.

Fashion has been a tool for me to accept and celebrate my individuality, and has become a way for me to express my identity unapologetically.

Additionally, my designs display the way I view the world and my hope for the future.

What’s one thing you wish the fashion industry would leave behind—and one thing it should embrace?
I wish the fashion industry would leave behind fast fashion. I don’t understand how we haven’t yet. And I think if we embraced the idea of developing individual personal style rather than following trends, we would be able to move away from fast fashion.

Who or what has shaped your design values most?
My design values are shaped by my own personal morals and ethics, which I can probably attribute to my family and the way I was raised. I was raised vegetarian, and grew up thrifting all of my clothes. I was brought up to have empathy for all other life, and my parents are always super eco-conscious. I never made a conscious decision to start designing sustainably, and it never felt like a choice; it just feels like a moral obligation I have to the world.

If you could design for anyone in the world, who would it be—and why?
My favorite designer of all time is Vivienne Westwood. If I can answer this question with the use of time travel, my answer is Vivienne Westwood. Fashion, to me, is political, and Vivienne is an incredible example of this. For Vivienne Westwood, fashion was not about aesthetics, but about challenging the status quo and expressing discontent with societal norms.

Three things keeping you sane right now
Making things (knitting, weaving, embroidering – anything to keep my hands busy), rewatching old seasons of Law & Order Special Victims Unit, and overpriced vanilla oat milk lattes from the coffee shop around the corner.

One word to describe your design approach: Thoughtful